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Jaffna fishermen complain against SLA restrictions before LLRC

2010 Nov 12

Representatives of Maathakal Fishermen Society complained Friday to the Lessons Learnt & Reconciliation Committee (LLRC) against the closure of the fishing jetties in Valikaamam North High Security Zone (HSZ) of Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and the continuing restrictions to fish using the only jetty in the area, in A’laveddi Mahajana Hall Friday.

Witnessing before LLRC, the representative from Maathakal pointed to the LLRC that Sri Lanka government that had urgently executed the verdict of the Supreme Court to demerge the North and East had failed to execute the Supreme Court verdict to allow resettlement in Valikaamam North HSZ though the two verdicts were given on the same day.

The fishermen society representative said that only Usumaanthu’rai fishing jetty is allowed to use in fishing and even there fishermen have to obtain passes from the SLA authorities to fish during limited hours.

All the other fishing jetties located along the border of the HSZ are closed by SLA and the fishermen have to walk ten miles up and down a day to fish from Usumaanthu’rai jetty, he said.

The representative requested LLRC to help open the closed fishing jetties for their use.

Meanwhile, five family members of disappeared persons told the LLRC panel how they were swindled into paying nearly two million rupees to persons who promised to release their disappeared sons and daughters and added that the money was given to persons who stood in front of the SLA camp in Jaffna town. They further told LLRC that a Divisional Secretary and a Village Officer are involved in this swindle.

When they had complained to the SLA camp officials the complainants were told that they know nothing about the persons who got the money, the family members told LLRC.

The Centre for Human Rights and Research (CHR) Sri Lanka, www.chrsrilanka.com the sister organization of Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CaFFE) www.caffe.lk, was established in 2010 in a bid to address the growing human rights concerns in the country and to educate the people about issues which have been neglected by the main stream media or civil society groups for various reasons. In addition to our continuous work with CSOs and human rights activism, in the past four years we have studied, spoken about and published greatly on Freedom of Information, Academic Freedom, and the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC).